HG's Charity Shop Hop
I live about 15 miles from my old stomping ground of Milton Keynes,
I lived there for 40 years and was quite glad to see the back of the place
to be honest. I still head that way once a week however to do my radio
show which is broadcast from the back of an industrial estate carpark
in the rougher part of town.
My visit to MK on this occasion coincided with me having to go to our
studio to record a session with a new band called Joana & The Wolf.
I could not miss out on the opportunity to have a wander through the
quaint streets of Stony Stratford which is the posher {most expensive}
part of the city, where there are several charity shops and smarter coffee shops*.
*It was in one of these that the scene in a tea room was filmed for Withnail & I.
Anyway, off I went with optimism in my heart and about £15 in my pocket...
Stony Stratford is such a foppish-town that it has a "special" welcome
sign that for some strange reason looks a bit like a gravestone.
Of course SS is probably most famous for being the original source of
the well known English catchphrase "a Cock and Bull Story", which began
when tales were exchanged between drunken punters of the 2 pubs,
The Cock and The Bull, both in the high street and are 20 yards from each other.
My first stop was the Willen Hospice shop, but going by previous visits
I was not optomistic. I did bump into dj Andy Kershaw going through it's
boxes a few years ago but I remember that the only record I have found
here in over 10 years is Peter Wyngarde's album - which was nice.
The overpriced stock (£1.99 does seem a little steep to me} yields little
joy, however there was a Mary Mungo & Midge LP and some old Irish Folk
comp hidden in the depths, but I didn't buy 'em, sorry.
Round the corner & opposite the Bull Hotel however was the legendary
RSPCA shop. I have had some incredible buys in here over the years and
am rarely disappointed when I pop in.
Todays vinyl choice was pretty grim tho, a box of Geoff Love
& old TOTP albums, cheap as chips but all shit.
The cds are a better buy, 10p each for albums by Stone Roses, Tull, etc
with my bag of booty, £1.20 well spent, I head to the Red Cross shop over the road.
Never that much in here but I have come across boxes of cd promos dumped
by local djs, so I had fingers x
pretty much as I expected, Nelson Riddle & Mantovani box sets....
a few doors up is a bit of a tease of a shop, they sometimes sell cds
{but not today} so it's mostly overpriced books you could pick up at
a car boot for a fifth of the price, ah well, onwards.
the Age Concern shop over the road used to be a lovely old bakery called
Hazeldines that was there for 150 years until they couldn't cope with the
supermarket around the corner.
It's a grim visit with slim pickings, some tapes, VHS videos and NO vinyl, rats.
across the road my hopes were higher as it was in this very same
Oxfam shop in 1986 where I picked up beautiful UK mono copies of
Pink Floyds' Piper & Saucerful in MINT condition. I still have them &
have never forgotten their origin!
as I approach the racks I see a lovely Sonny Terry & Brownie McGee
album sitting at the front for £1.99 in great condition, that will do nicely
but that was all there was.
as I head out of Stony I drive up to the industrial estate between the
town & our studio dropping into the Age Concern Warehouse.
I know there is always a lot of records upstairs but in the downstairs office...
... they keep the "pricey stuff", hmmm, lets have a peek shall we?
an old Gospel album and an import by The Association, nothing to
get too excited about then, damn!
I wander upstairs to seek out the hidden treasures
and this was the pick of the bunch, a Mandingo best of on MFP
in near mint condition and ok for 25p.. So that was the end of my
charity shop hop in Milton Keynes, I know all there are dozens more
shops spread across the city, 13 in Bletchley alone.
But thats gonna have to be another day, maybe next week!
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Originally Posted by Sam
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